* All reviews are the opinion of Melbourne Mum, and are not sponsored.

In Melbourne, we really are spoilt for choice when it comes to cafes. We had grand plans of having brunch at Monsieur Truffe on Father’s Day (as you do), until we rocked up at 10.30 and were informed that there wouldn’t be any tables until at least 12.30. They are so getting 0 points for kid-friendliness. I mean, who suggests waiting around for 2 hours with a toddler and a 6 year old? Yuh-ha, nup.

So we popped next door to El Mirage instead, having no idea this place even existed (even though it’s been here since late 2006). To say our expectations were exceeded is probably not saying much given that we were still feeling the sting of not getting a table next door and our expectations were low, but seriously, this place is GREAT.

The interior reminded me of a modernised 1970′s caravan, with cement floors, wood panelling starting at the walls and curving up onto the ceiling and funky retro green wallpaper defining the area between the walls and the couch seating. Loved that. The service was friendly, efficient and not at all snooty (but maybe we had a lucky day). Really loved that. The food, whilst not particularly adventurous, was tasty and compared to many other cafes/restaurants in the area, inexpensive.

There is no kid’s menu but the food is pretty standard with generous servings and would satisfy most fussy palates. We had the tex-mex beans on toast, pancakes with lemon curd and mascarpone and the ciabatta with salami, rocket and cheese and a side of home fries. I’m fussy about my home fries. So many places get them wrong, with undercooked or soggy spuds. Not this place. Beautifully crispy on the outside, soft in the middle. I’d go back solely for the home fries.

The coffee is good also but then, I’m a softie when it comes to places the serve the froth with a little heart-shaped flourish.

What was the bill?: Lunch for 4 + coffee for 2 (and babycinos/hot chocolates for the kiddies) – $50 (an absolute steal)

Where is it? El Mirage, 349 Lygon Street, Brunswick East (no website. Is that geek-speak for “we’re so cool we don’t have a website?”)

How kid-friendly is it?: 8/10. No kids menu, but pretty large selection, highchairs, cash only. I would call this place suitable for most kids, but on Father’s Day, with the high ceilings, the acoustics of the space made it seem a bit chaotic and loud – not good for kids who don’t respond so favourably to such an environment!

I don’t recommend them. My new neurosurg (he’s tops!) has recommended that we (by “we” I mean, “he”) do a CT/Angiogram every 5 years to stave off any pesky new aneurysms. I’ve been having a pretty intense, lingering headache this past few weeks so I thought it was a tops idea. Of course, I’d forgotten about the reality of the Angiogram.

The last (and ahem, first) time I had one my brain was haemorrhaging so bad I thought I was going to die, so the only vague recollection I have of it was the sensation of hot coffee spreading through my brain. The idea of the bleeding (sorry, no pun intended. No, really) things is to poke dye into your bod via a drip (the first one was in my groin, today’s was in my arm) so that it highlights all the vessels they want to take piccies of to look for any anomalies. Great theory, right?

I was warned that I could feel nauseous. Was warned that it would feel weird. Hey, I thought, I’ve had a baby spew forth into the world via my lovely loins, what could possibly feel weirder than that? Well. An angiogram feels weirder. It only lasts about 10 minutes, but in that 10 minutes the weird-arse sensation of pulsing pressurised hot coffee through my whole body made me want to upchuck. I’d fasted for 2 hours prior so that I wouldn’t actually hurl, but anyone who knows me knows that without food for any period of time I’m a grumpy space-cadet capable of a grunt here and there, otherwise I’m likely to BITE YOUR FUCKING HEAD OFF. You heard me. You judge which Me you would want to meet in a dark alley.

They look a bit different to this nowadays. (Shot from The Exorcist)

I also have a fear/phobia of CT machines. I hate them. I think it harks back to my formative years watching poor old Reagan going through the CT scan to look for any demonic “lesions”. I call the machine the Pizza Oven because, well, that’s what they look like. I’m waiting for the nurse to come in and spread tomato, ham and fior de latte (because hey, I’m a Melbourne girl) onto my body before sticking me under there. Hmmm. Pizza.

So I’m lying on this stupid CT machine, with the clackety clack whirr of the CT machine circling my head, hot coffee going through my brain and nether regions, thinking about PIZZA, wanting to vomit so badly over the million dollar CT machine and wondering whether Max Von Sydow really was an Exorcist and I’m not even allowed to bloody well move. Sucks to be me, right? I had a minor panic attack inside the machine and to keep the panic at bay I imagined myself on a beach, the warm sand behind my head with Dean Winchester in an early stage of undress about to rub suntan on my other hot bits. OK, I lied about the Winchester boy but not out of any angelic sense of chastity, oh no. I just plain forgot. Would have worked a treat, though. Maybe I do have demons in my head, after all. Might not be such a bad thing.

It saddened me to read about Charlotte Dawson’s hospitalisation this week over an online Twitter troll onslaught. Outrageous that these cowards can hide behind an online avatar and abuse, bully and harass someone they’ve never met into a psych ward. It’s all very well to say “Ignore them” and of course, you have to, but there’s only so much of “go hang yourself” and “put yourself in a toaster” you can take before something snaps.

I don’t know Charlotte, but by all accounts she’s a smashing bird (and I was totally gunning for her during Celebrity Apprentice). To me, she seems straight-to-the point, honest and authentic. That’s hardly the point though. I don’t know her any more than these online cowards do.

I had an experience in Japan where my fledgling site, 35degrees.com was simultaneously hacked and flamed by an anonymous troll. It was pretty mild stuff, this person (who I assumed by the name it used was a he, but who knows?) didn’t implore me to dive in front of a bus or slit my own throat, but the jibes still hurt. It was personal, about my writing and my perceptions of my experience, but I had to ignore this person. I did respond once or twice, saying “If you don’t like what I have to say, then don’t read it”, but I stopped when I realised it just wasn’t worth engaging. That it’s their agenda to affect you and by responding you are only reinforcing the idea that you give a fuck about their misplaced vitriol.

What the experience did make me do, though, was hide my “name” identity from the online world. What you read on my blog is the truth as I see it, and I want people to know part of my name to establish a “virtual” connection if you like, but if I don’t know you in person, you won’t know my full name. People might wonder why I do this, and here is why:

Online trolls are sad cowards who use anonymity to hurt others (including outwardly “strong” people like Charlotte) because they don’t have the guts to take them on in person. I’m not condoning bullying of any sort, online or otherwise, but if your attacker is a faceless skulker, who thinks they’re being “smart” and “funny”, who the hell really knows what they’re capable of away from the safe cocoon of their own computer? I’m not prepared to take that chance. I’m not prepared to take that chance for my family. For my kids. Or maybe I’m fooling myself that people aren’t able to work out my identity from what I write on my blog. It’s a terribly vulnerable feeling, but I guess that’s the risk I take.

All very well to say and probably true to a degree, but we cannot condone online bullying. Ever. And we certainly can’t define our success (or otherwise) by them.

But I’m not a celebrity. I feel incredibly bad for people like Charlotte who are in the public eye and not always in control of what is being portrayed in the media. Charlotte is not perfect and people are not always going to agree with what she writes on Twitter or what she says anywhere for that matter. But I’m not talking about constructive dissent or differences of opinion. When you are imploring someone to jump off a ledge because of their legal opinions, you can piss off in a blaze of your own self-congratulatory, sad cowardice. That is all.

Otherwise known as a Lagerita, this is the turbo-version of the humble Shandy that I used to quaff from my dad’s glass as an 8 year old. So hard core retro, I’m dedicating it to the sentimental carcrash that is my Puberty Blues Brain and calling it the Shire Shandy. You’ll be packing death that your kids will catch you with one of these.

Shake tequila, Cointreau & fresh lime and pour over ice into a glass. Fill the rest of the glass with the beer. If you’re feeling really sexy, you could edge the glass with lime juice & salt. Game on, moles!

I know it’s hella-hypocritical to be as non crafty as me and post a crafty story, but I’ve been so inspired and awestruck by the creative goodness that Scout’s school community has mustered for the Father’s Day Stall (Phew. Long sentence headspin). Have I told you before how much I love my/her/our school?

The gifts below are a tiny portion of the masses donated by the fiendishly creative mums (we have a lot of them). My best nod to craftiness was brokering some sweet deals with the Preppies over their coveted coin purses and shoving my camera in everyone’s faces with rabid festivity, entreating them to “SMILE”! I’d probably make a really good drug dealer. But some of the amazing items I looked at and went “Wow, even I could do that” – really simple but effective ideas (and others not so simple, crafted by sheer genius).

Yes, I know, shut the f*ck up and show us the CRAFT. It’s all about the CRAFT with you guys, isn’t it?

That’s the ticket! And something the kiddies could do at home (while you’re swilling vodka) (Emma K)

Tintin Photo Frames (Catherine A)

Not without my Superhero Wheatpack! (Catherine A)

Reclaimed Windmills made from bottles (Zoe N)

Key Straps for the forgetful Superhero in your life (Amanda D)

Star Wars iPad cover (Catherine A)

I’m sorry, this is the best idea EVER. And what better way to make your old Richard Marx albums useful? I guess you could just burn them.

This is one of my favourite bevvies ever. Only one spirit used, so it’s easy too. The trick is to get enough of this into you to get you nicely toasty. I like to use Captain Morgans or Sailor Jerry Jamaican Rum (anything but Bundy). Fuckin’ eh!

Rebecca suffered a cavernous malformation/angioma when she was 36 weeks pregnant with her first child. She tells her story to Melbourne Mum:

“When I was 36 weeks pregnant, I was hanging up the washing and something happened to my vision. I thought initially it was some string on my face from the washing so went inside and washed my face. Within about 5 minutes I had pins and needles in my hands and feet and my face was numb. I called my husband and we headed up to the hospital. My obstetrician came in and ran some bloods and it was decided that I had a migraine and was sent home with panadeine forte.

My headache progressed throughout the night and I became very confused, hallucinating (seeing turtles!) and I couldn’t see out of my left eye. Everything, like the car, the garden, everything looked small.

I stayed in bed for 4 days thinking I had a horrific migraine. On the fifth day, I made an appointment to see a neurologist who also said it was a migraine but offered an MRI “to put my mind at ease”. The MRI was booked for the following Tuesday. I was 37 weeks pregnant.

After the MRI the radiologist came out and said they had “seen an area of concern on my brain”. When pushed he said he had seen a bleed.

I had my daughter 5 days later via C-section (she had steroids first to mature her lungs). She was born at 37.5 weeks and weighed 2.2 kg.

The day after she was born I was diagnosed with a massive Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT) in my left leg and I had an IVC filter inserted that night. I spent 6 weeks in hospital having multiple MRI’s Cerebral Angiograms and stayed on a heparin drip.

Once home we changed neurosurgeons and received a date for a biopsy and a craniotomy, to remove the cavernous malformation in my right occipital lobe. I was admitted for surgery when my daughter was 5 months old. I continued to breastfeed my daughter throughout my stay in hospital and in the Intensive Care Unit.

A cavernous malformation is similar to an aneurysm, but slightly different – it is a vascular abnormality of the central nervous system and consists of a cluster of abnormal, dilated vessels.

I was told at my follow up appointment that it would be to dangerous for me to have another baby so my husband and I started researching surrogacy in India.

When my daughter was 14 months old, I sought a second opinion from my current neurosurgeon. He thought me doing surrogacy was crazy and gave me his blessings to try for another baby. I sought another opinion from the US and another opinion within Australia. Both of them were happy for me to proceed. In August, when my daughter was 19 months old, I fell pregnant with my second.

When I was 20 weeks pregnant I has my first focal seizure, followed by another when I was 26 weeks. I commenced anti-epileptic medication and was on clexane injections (a blood thinner) for the entire duration of my pregnancy. My second daughter was born via planned C-section at 37 weeks and she spent 10 days in special care.

I finished my blood thinner medication at 6 weeks post-partum.

I’m planning on having a third baby! I see my neurosurgeon every 6 months for MRIs which continue to be stable and I take anti-epileptic drugs every day and continue to breastfeed my now 15 month old.”

I just love this story. I think it’s a brave way to live your life, to have an illness, and live your life in spite of it.

If you have survived an aneurysm, or AVM, or cavernous malformation and have had a baby after it, I’d love you to be part of this series. Please contact me via my contact page.